I was running along Tulpehocken street with my backpack, my purse, and my guitar. I didn't want to miss the train after work. A lady pulled up, and asked if I needed a ride to the station. After hesitation, I climbed in. She ended up taking me all the way to City Hall, since she was headed that way. I think her name was Margaret?
As we pulled into the roundabout around City Hall and she moved closer to the center, we saw lots of people with signs, and I jumped out before we held up too much traffic.
Apparently, we are the 99%.
We are the 99 percent. We are getting kicked out of our homes. We are forced to choose between groceries and rent. We are denied quality medical care. We are suffering from environmental pollution. We are working long hours for little pay and no rights, if we're working at all. We are getting nothing while the other 1 percent is getting everything. We are the 99 percent.
The Occupy Philly's 99% Declaration lists two demands: 1) a national general assembly by next July 4th; and 2) an addressing of its list of grievances. The general tone lays the responsibility to find solutions on the vaguley-defined 1% who is blamed on making this mess (two girls at the info table said, "well, you know, it's their fault"). If you go to their tumblr account featuring direct stories, where the recurring issue is a legitimate need for jobs with a living wage, or a means to get an education to get such a job, without exorbitant debt. Many make a point to say they know they are the lucky ones, which I appreciate. While not reflected in the tumblr, at the demonstration military activities were often pointed to as a poor use of government funds, in light of this need.
Jobs are good. People need jobs. But I don't like blaming the 1% cartoon villain for all the problems. Particularly when, at a global level, most of America's 99% -and certainly its most vocal - is actually the 1%.
We - including myself - need to spend more time occupying ourselves: finding ways to create solutions, changing our spending and giving habits, becoming local entrepeneurs, like people who started Grameen Bank micro-finance loans. That's what I've been troubled about lately, in the midst of dream jobs and real jobs and the PBS Series Women, War and Peace, where Muslim and Christian women "prayed the devil back to hell" through protest, song, and political pressure.
That and homesickness, OC Music Awards music, and wonderful BuildaBridge classes, where kids learn how to be Doug E. Fresh and dougie, and sing along "everybody loves me." Awesome, powerful talks about being fresh and loved from that. Plus incredible energy with the kids, and even the women passing by. Particularly in a context of homelessness, where "freshness" isn't so easily come by, this was...good.
I’ve been trying to be less lame and more proactive. Got my laptop looked at, bought some work-out gear I’d been needing, scheduled and followed-through with some hanging out so that I’d be happy with a social life. Took initiative at work to be happier and more productive. I’ve spoken up more, and kept silent when I wanted, too.
Mission Less Lame Quasi Accomplished.
Getting priorities right is weird, though. Because I’m happy to do these things, but they’re pretty self-focused, while the world spins on. Palestine’s making its bid for nationhood, and everybody’s hyped about what should happen. And I don’t know what SHOULD be done, but I know it seems wrong for the U.S. to ask people to not show up for the vote. As I sit at a pizza place in Germantown, the manager switched from the military channel WWII war movements analysis to the news because “it’s not good to eat to.” There’s something about terrorists on the news, but before I can find out what, he switches to sports and shrugs.
And just as quick as turning the channel, I start thinking about me again. Because in a random perfume commercial I really identified with the script: “I’m not going to be the person I’m expected to be anymore.”
But that doesn’t mean I don’t want to be somebody who doesn’t care – or do anything – about “the bigger issues.”
There’s a group called Plan that I’ve never heard of before. There was a guy doing sidewalk marketing in center city, and I stopped and talked with him a bit. They began in 1937 helping Spanish children during the civil war, but now have significantly broader work around the world, both in war areas as well as with human trafficking victims, etc. It turns out they published Anna Freud’s work “War and Children,” which I started reading online until it wouldn’t let me read more.
Interesting because I wouldn’t fill out the form – had never heard of them before. But I asked a lot of questions to the point of what they do and their success, etc. I’m realizing it’s not enough to care. You gotta be good at what you do – knowledgeable, too.
It’s weird. Someone I know and respect made a rather prejudiced remark the other day about Jews, regarding the stereotype of them lacking generosity. Weirder, still, when it was pointed out by a third party that I’m part-Jewish, because rather than say it was a joke, they explained that it’s really true. I was pretty surprised. I shrugged and said something about there’s always some truth in stereotypes. LAME. Later when they checked to see if I had been offended, rather than explain my surprise that such a stereotype would still be so strongly believed, I shrugged it off by saying I wasn’t real connected with that part of my identity anyways. DOUBLE LAME.
So when I came across Anna Freud’s work “War and Children” on the Plan site, I wished I had known about it before, so I could’ve given her as a counter-example. And it reminded me of Einstein’s role in the creation of the International Rescue Committee, which works with refugees. And I wished I had given him as an informed counter-example.
I bring all this up because it was a learning experience for me. I sucked at something I care deeply about (reconciliation in general, not even specific to that issue). If I had been better-prepared/trained/informed, I could have made fruitful dialogue. Instead, I was worse than a push-over. Which sadly, is quite the stereotype of the warm-hearted person. It’s expected that they’ll also be soft-spoken, and that they won’t be strong-minded (or if they are, it’s to the extreme of abrasive bull-headedness).
SAD DAY. So I’m going to try and be more proactive about…not…being those expected stereotypes. And maybe then it’ll be:
Mission Less Lame Accomplished.
Partly to make myself feel less lame, please respond with learning moments when you were lame, what you learned, and how you are trying to be less lame in the future....
P.S. Before feeling any disapproval for the person in my story about prejudice, STOP. This person is, from my view, quite well-educated, globally aware, sensitive and caring. Not a bad guy in a story, but rather just as much as a reminder as my own role in the story that despite our best intentions, everyone has prejudcies we have to work at getting rid of so as to become less lame. Because that, after all, is the purpose of life. ;)
"If you built castles in the sky ; your work need not be lost ; that is where they should be. Now, put the foundations under them. " - Henry David Thoreau
I still don't quite know where my castles stand, or how they're laid out. I think I've become too busy trying to build foundations that I've forgotten to look up and dream and let go. I'm trying to, though. Someone asked me what I want a day ago, and it was strange because I hadn't thought in those terms for a very long time. I still don't particularly have an answer to that, or answers in general. But the question helped. My professor shared this quote freshman year, and, like many of his students, it's stuck with me:
“Be patient toward all that is unsolved in your heart and try to love the questions themselves. Do not now seek the answers, which cannot be given you because you would not be able to live them. And the point is to live everything. Live the questions” - Rainer Maria Rilke
There's so many life questions I use that for, but one most particularly:
God?
The answers I get confuse me. A lot. Today I was thinking about such things, when Micah 6:8 came to mind:
or, put another way,
Although I became familiar with this because of its social justice aspect, it's the last part that I resonate with most strongly. For me, that is my heart. At least, I want it to be. Even the cross is empty of its power if you do not approach it with humility. Today, that is an answer.
And since I'm just a little Sarah, I go back to that first question more just about me and what I'm doing. And I go back to the Rilke quotation about the point being to live everything - both questions and answers. I don't even know exactly what my dream is yet, what castles I want to build, how I want to use my hands to help. But that's good, because it keeps me humble with the interests I do have. I'm kind of all over the place. I might not yet have many answers about what my dream job is or should be. But I believe I can do something good with my hands. Thanks partially to my friend Amber's collaborative art piece With These Hands. Here's mine.
I also remember what godly professors taught me about worship being at the heart of mission, and what vocation we all share, and about goodness, truth, and beauty, and - yes - about walking humbly with your God. I think of all of that when I think about my dream job. And I know I have to be brave. Because I know what I want my answer to that first question to be:
Today had several interesting scenes, so I thought I'd just share snippets! My life isn't usually this interesting. Or maybe it is, and I don't notice.
Well, first, let me fast forward through my morning, which I spent at home, mostly in bed, but also on the computer and playing guitar.
I took the bus and walked to the new house I'll be moving into next month to sign the lease. The first thing I noticed walking in was that Charla - the 32-year-old who owns the house and paints on the patio, makes lamps in the basement, who had applied to BuildaBridge and who goes to the FitLife Gym with her and soon to be my roommates - was wearing those interesting Barefoot running shoes, that are like toe socks and just entirely very unique. Very fitting since later that day I'd be watching the music video that goes to Brett Dennen's Make You Crazy song:
While I was waiting for Charla to get the lease, I sat and looked out the window. There was a beautiful, large monarch butterfly perched on the aptly-named butterfly bush in the front yard. It made me be still for a moment with it. Every once in a while I see a butterfly or a speck of dandelion fluff, and whenever I do, it reminds me of things good and true and beautiful.
Then, as I walked to work along Washington Lane, I passed a house that had a small kiddie pool on its front lawn, complete with 7 adorable kids stuffed inside like sardines. As I walked away, one little girl kept yelling to her older brothers, "Somebody dunk me." They complied. :)
At work I started making the first few phone calls to connect with past alumni and donors. I got to talk with a friend from the Institute, Stevie Neale, and learned about her work doing choreography for a k-2 theatre group. Imagine that age group learning about the Circle of Life through Lion King, and then playing a dance game where one little girl yells out, "Let me see your omnivore!" to get all the kids to pretend to eat grass. Yeah, it was adorable when I imagined it, too.
After work, I was walking along Germantown Avenue, and decided to check out the BuildaBridge Artology summer camp art installation on the front lawn of Cliveden House. As I looked, a boy walked by and asked if I liked it. I said I did, and began talking with him. Josh attended his third year of Artology this summer. He's in 5th or 6th grade. His favorite part of the camp was the water fight. His second favorite part was going to a glass-blowing studio. We walked on together half a block before he was stopped by an older woman who greeted him by name.
I continued walking to the Wired Bean Cafe, for the open mic night. The sign-up list was empty for the first 15 minutes, and so the host, a middle-aged white guy, continued playing renditions of the likes of Adele and the Eagles - using the same chords! As I was waiting for my drink, a woman in line turns to me and says, "I'm Katie." I give a double-take, and I realize it's a lady from the Circle of Hope church, for whom I've babysat. Their cell group had decided to meet at the cafe that night. I smile, because I was a bad little Sarah and ditched my cell group that night for the open mic night, reasoning that a discussion about if we need an inner life might be one-upped by a night of music as inner life.
I was right. Great music. Eda James "At Last," Ingrid Michaelson's "Keep Breathing," and Sam Cooke's version of "Summertime," to name a few. There was also an old man with some fun rhyming jokes, as well as a man who had found bongo drums in the trash and taught himself how to play. The first hour was mostly older men and women. Later, a group of 3-4 girls, all black, came with this white guy who played guitar, and they just brought the house down. But EVERYBODY got cheered for, everyone felt appreciated. I sure did!
It was fun to look out the wall-length windows across the street, where a black man with a Muslim white robe and hat stood outside of a Hong Kong Chinese restaurant, next to a Mermaid Bar, with a younger black guy in a tank top stood. A couple ran by with the guy pushing the girl's back to get her to go faster. The mostly white Circle of Hope cell group met on the patio.
I wrote a story about Atlanta for the BuildaBridge website, below, but also here.
BuildaBridge and Refugee Family Services (RFS) were waiting for the last act of their BuildaBridge Arts Week Celebration, and all eyes were on a smaller boy at the front of Class 4. Kay Do So projected a sense of serenity and calm as he stood with his back to the audience, facing his class, arms high and ready to begin conducting. No one had coached him to stand with such poise; it just came naturally over the course of the week as he became more knowledgeable about what sounds he wanted produced and how to bring them about. With a flick of the wrist, he signaled his classmates to begin.
On the first day of arts camp, their music class had begun with introducing the heartbeat rhythm, but it quickly became a near free-for-all, as each student plucked, banged, and blew on instruments to their hearts’ content, with little regard for any guidance or instruction. While I knew how far the class had come since then, I was curious to see how well they listened to one another and controlled their voices and instruments. Some of the boys from Class 4 were so excited, that when Class 3 went up before them for their music performance, they began chanting along quietly, elbowing each other and smiling. I didn’t need to worry. By the end of the week, Ms. Josie had successfully harnessed that energy, and taught them how to control their music and enjoy themselves. In fact, the class had been planning and plotting their performance earlier that day.
Kay Do So kept his wand and his entire body low to the ground, signaling his friends to begin quietly, as they had discussed. Many of the kids imitated him, ducking their heads down near the drums as they lightly hit it, or bending conspiratorially towards one another as they began saying his name in rhythm to the beat, the same heartbeat introduced at the beginning of the week. Everyone’s eyes were riveted on the wand, and when it pointed to another classmate, they began chanting that child’s name as a single voice, much to her delight.
As Kay Do So raised the wand higher and higher, the whole class strummed, drummed, sang and smiled harder and harder. They had been waiting for this moment, and their eyes shone with excitement, as the whole room reverberated with their rhythm. They ended by singing their version of “We Will Rock You.” Each child had the chance to sing one of the lines of the verses they had written, and they all sang the chorus together, ending with a cheer, “Class 4!”One of the class 4 students, Amanuel, doing visual arts about the heart
The class had begun with the metaphor of the heartbeat, that each person and each group has a unique heartbeat, and that music is the heartbeat of the world. That first day, each child played only what they wanted to, how they wanted to, or if they wanted to. By the last day, they came together as a class, listened to one another, and responded musically to one another. They found their class heartbeat.
The next day, I found their community heartbeat. Rosa Dunkley, RFS’s Youth Development Coordinator and one of our lovely hosts, drove Julia and I around some of the apartments where the kids live. Turning into some complexes felt like entering another world, with refugees living together from Somalia, Thailand, Bosnia, Burma, Iraq, Sudan, and Burundi, to name a few. I saw people sharing life together: hanging laundry on a line, walking on errands, talking to neighbors, or watching kids play soccer and bicycle. Some of the complexes looked clean and safe, and even had a pool. Some still had the debris from when one of the buildings had burned down, taking the lives of several of the youth with it. Some, Rosa shared, had landlords that had stolen from the refugees. One no longer had many refugees because of tensions with the Americans also living there. Several times we spotted “our” kids, playing and talking and living. When they saw us, we smiled and waved like crazy people. Whether or not they saw us, I saw them, and I heard them. I had spent a week with them talking about heartbeats, but I had not yet discovered theirs, until that trip. It is strong, communal, resilient, and hopeful, vibrating with vitality.
Yesterday I had my first official day as a paid employee of BuildaBridge. Fun :) Rather obviously, I am staying in Philly. The probationary period is three months, at which point we'll review my work, and I'll review my finances. If all is well enough, the position is a year-long one.
Still more than a little weird to think about.
In the meantime, I'm probably signing a 3-month lease this week at a cheaper house. Dr. Corbitt was kind enough to volunteer to drive me around the area at night, so that I can get a feel for how safe it will be, particularly for coming back after work at the restaurant or back on public transportation after an evening in center city. We will see, but the girls seem nice (three of them). The room is pretty much a very big closet, it's so small, but I think it'll work fine.
As for Atlanta: I came. I saw. I sang.
I'll write a separate blog, or a few separate ones, to tell about those stories. It was good. Great, really. I led opening music with all 56 of the kids aged 4-14 every morning for half an hour. That's a lot of kids. And a lot of singing. I liked it. I learned a lot, and made a few friends along the way. And a lot of memories.
Today was the last day of my internship. I feel relief mixed with sadness. My work with BuildBridge isn’t quite over, so there’s no good-byes. But it is another transition. I feel like a spectator to my own life, curious and wondering what’s next. I’m being proactive with job applications, but I can’t shake the feeling. My mom arrived today, and it’s nice but strange to see where and how I live through her eyes. Again, I feel like a distant observer, realizing how very odd of a time of life it is.
Tomorrow we head for the Pittsburgh area to see family; my aunt is having a retirement party. Looks like transitions don’t ever end. That takes me back to last year and graduation and transition talks with torrey peeps. My cousins will be quite a bit older, one of them fresh from his first year at college in Atlanta.
The Institute went really well. I wish the people could have stayed altogether though, instead of returning to their homes in Ohio, Canada, Kansas, New York, and more. It was revitalizing to be with young people my age, full of enthusiasm and ideas, tempered and given wisdom by faculty with experience, know-how, and a strong desire to provide mentorship. It was also encouraging to get to be a part of making it happen. It’s been a while since I’ve been that person, the one that makes things happen. I missed that. It was a huge blessing to also be able to attend classes and do some serious soul-searching about the work.
I believed arts could bring healing before, and I saw it with the kids I worked with. But now I feel the true power arts, to bring transformation, beating in my breast, pushing me onward. I still don’t know quite which road to take, but I don’t want to forget to march to that rhythm.
As I say that, I think of a little girl, D, from the class I helped with at WAA – Women Against Abuse. D has been increasingly close to my heart over the few weeks as I’ve grown as an assistant and learned more about how to help her with her sadness and anger and insecurity. I should have filled this blog the past month or two with stories about her, and about WAA, but I haven’t know how, it’s been too close. D is a little 4-year-old girl. The first day of class, she was the only student, and we were reading a book about Anansi the Spider, but D didn’t like Anansi. So she hit him (the picture on the book). She often threatened physical punishment against kids who she saw as “misbehavin.” She also, almost every class, would at one point hide underneath a table, lie down and begin whimpering, or run away. On one such occasion, I came after her and tried to reason with her that a boy didn’t do anything wrong by holding the book about Anansi (I’ve since learnt that reasoning with a 4-year-old is not always the best course of action). She began saying she wasn’t pretty, that nobody loved her. I was shocked. She also continued threatening to hurt the boy with whom she was angry. That day, Dr. Vivian Nix-Early (one of the BuildaBridge co-founders, the COO, and also a clinical psychologist) stepped in, because I didn’t know what to do or how to help. She took D aside and explained she shouldn’t be mad at the boy, because the only reason she was missing class was herself, and as soon as she calmed down, she could come back. She told D she couldn’t come back until she was done crying, and then she let D cry for a while. Eventually, she asked D if she could clean off her face in the bathroom. Dr. V later told me D began again saying she wasn’t beautiful, and so as she cleaned her face she just told her how beautiful she was, and specific things she found beautiful about D. Another week, I used the same method. The look in her eyes was so vulnerable. That killed me, too.
We had our final celebrations for the two classes I assisted with. At WAA, Women Against Abuse, the little girl that was “my baby,” “D,” wasn’t there. That day her mom had got in a fight. It kinda killed me that she missed her celebration. I miss her. I wish I knew now from working with her and from the Institute back when I first met her. Not that I now know so much, but I know a little more, and maybe I could have helped more.
It’s unsettling. This feeling, of wishing I could’ve helped more, it’s reminding me of something else. One of my friends from Uganda passed last month, two weeks after his birthday. He had suffered with depression due to the malaria meds. The details of his death were not shared, but I think it’s a word I don’t feel like saying. It’s amazing how you strong of an emotion guilt may be, whatever justifications are used to try to reason the emotion away. Which, by the way, is another thing I learned at the Institute, about brain development and emotion versus reason, particularly in kids, and how art can bridge that. Anyways. David was a blessing in my life. He helped me see things more clearly. It makes me angry, that I or somebody didn’t help him more, although I know he had friends and amazing family and therapists that were helping him. It makes me want to make myself someone who could help.
I feel like there’s a lot to miss in life right now: people, opportunities, purpose, peace. It makes me not want to waste any time, but sometimes time is what you need. I think that’s what I need to do for a while, sit and be still and let time do it’s thing and I do mine until the water is still.
I’ve been here 3 months. I had my half-way discussion with my supervisor Danielle a week or two ago. I haven’t reached my goal of being able to coordinate a similar program, but I have a far more realistic understanding of the work necessary to do so. I’m learning about being myself while being professional and contextual. I’m taking initiative in setting small goals and creating action items to reach them, and fulfilling promises.
I understand more of the power behind BuildaBridge classes’ three foci: hope-infused, child-center and trauma-informed. Last week I had to physically remove and restrain an 8-year-old girl. Her brother had hurt her, and it triggered something raw. I want to be trauma-informed. I am becoming so, and will become more, as I get to take classes at the same Institute that I am planning at half-price. It’s still expensive, but I’d be a fool to pass it up. This experience is giving me more of a drive, to be relevant, to be ready, to be willing, to be engaged, to be in community.
I’m past college. It’s been a year (Greg Laswell song!). Not that I’m an adult. But I realized we’re strange at this age. It’s cool, as long as we know it. People are better together, as family, however that family looks. Brotherly love is hard. College students are both really bad and really good at being family to each other. I want to be family to people, but it's hard. Anyways.
When I went to another open mic, someone said I had an accessory with my guitar. It feels that way, like Malibu Stacy, only not. It opens up avenues for talking, carrying it around, even if it is heavy. When I first reached the train station on the way into the city, there was a guy playing his own guitar, and we talked. He’s a music ed major, and he has to learn several different instruments right now, which he’s never done before. It makes me think maybe it’s not so far-fetched for me.
I’m considering other far-fetched things, too. Like Georgia, for a 10 day arts camp through BaB with refugee youth. Like an internship in Atlanta, Georgia with refugees, through Fugees Family. Like staying in Philly. Or coming back to Cali but bringing the brotherly love with me. It depends on how the numbers add up. I miss Cali, and I miss family, and I miss free rent and belonging. But…idk.
I drive home from church cell with Barb and Liz most of the time. Last week Barb asked if I was getting what I wanted out of Philly, and what my plans were, where I was going. No, I don’t know, and Ill be somewhere. We laughed about it, because Liz had a similar answer when she was young about being somewhere, and that’s really still her answer and a lot of people’s answer. Because life’s full of questions. I don’t know where I’ll be. I’m trying not to care, though I do.
Did you know traditionally, Christ didn’t actually rise until Monday? There’s a blog entry by Daniel Majors (a Christian religious studies grad student in CA) that talks about this. I can’t find the link, but check him out at danielmajors.com. The point was simply about that tension of where we live today, in the already but not yet, the Sunday of Christ in the grave but not yet risen. Of course, Christ has risen, but I know Easter came and went for me and I still didn’t feel that hope that goes with that truth. And, for our world, it still has not yet experienced the full power of that.
Still, my Easter was definitely good. I worked. I ate an incredible staff lunch. I played guitar. I hung out with a friend who had a bad family experience over Easter.
Honestly, though, it seems a long time ago now. I’ve been busy at my internship, busy with my first time as an assistant teacher in the transitional shelters. It is powerful to see how vulnerable and sensitive children are to one another’s criticisms. It’s so easy to see in children, who don’t yet know how to hide their feelings, but I think adults are often nearly just as vulnerable. We just better at pretending we’re not. We play make believe. But don’t hate the player, hate the game, right? Yeah. Have you ever been in a shelter? I have been in one before this, but not for a very long time. Just to see the kids coming “home” from school and the moms (no dads in either) reading in the lobby with their kids…trying to make a life. Having a 4-year-old at a Women Against Abuse shelter punch a drawing of a character she didn’t like, and hear the mother tell her to be different from her mother. It’s different when you’re there. To see people working to get from Sunday to Monday, who have to hope that the grave isn’t the end of our story.
It certainly gives you perspective on your own financial worries. I’m less worried about money right now, though honestly more because of a small windfall than any mature, reflective considerations on my one day of work in the shelters. Last weekend I played guitar for a 17-year-old girl’s youtube vids, and her mom very generously compensated me. The girl is Taylor Bright, but the whole family and their friends were just very nice to meet, made me feel very appreciated and excited to be there. Anyways, I’ll be sure to let you know about the vid when it comes up.
Of course, my news is quite small compared to the big news of the week. Osama. I didn’t like the big news of the week. Not because I’m naive, though I probably am that, too. Not because verses about loving your enemy and not rejoicing in their deaths, either, though those are good things. It seemed pointless, and our response made me feel tired and hollow. I read about people celebrating in the streets, and my mind immediately went to 9/11 when people celebrated the deaths of American civilians. These are two very, very different situations, I would never want to minimize Osama’s sway to persuade through his hate-filled rhetoric, nor accuse the victims of 9/11 of harboring the same intent to cause harm to others that Osama did. I have read several of Osama’s speeches and letters. It made my heart sick.
But I do see in the two celebrations similar emotions of gloating and pride. Behind the rhetoric of justice and democracy and the war on terror and peace and making the world a safer place, really we just wanted to get ours, and save some face that it took us so long. So we did. Round of applause. Did it do any good? Maybe. Maybe not. But it didn’t make me want to celebrate. It reminded me it’s still Sunday. We’re still half in the grave. And sometimes we’re still just as sensitive and angry as the little kids I worked with. And I don’t mean that in a patronizing way. It is what it is.
Anyways. Luckily, later on Monday I talked on the phone with my brother after his first day of work and I called him a closet-hippy, and I watched Elf with friends, and Tuesday I danced in my room. Nothing like a little sweat to feel alive. :)
I’m going to a training tonight to be an assistant teacher with BuildaBridge, so I’m looking at the class schedule. I’m worrying about how I’ll be able to help, and how I’ll get to the class. And I’m opening up my bank account and worrying about if I can afford to have one more night a week I can’t work, where instead I spend money on public transportation to get to the class.
Worrying is lame. It’s for squares.
Luckily, I go to the circle of hope church, so…yeah…not square. Well…anyways. But we had a worship/prayer event last night focused around Christ’s high priestly prayer. It was good, mostly because people were honest (self included). It made me think about humility, and love and glory and peace.
On the ride home with the women in my cell group and Jonathan, we talked about television and ice cream. And then I played guitar with Jonathan a little bit and thought more about peace. And then I called Avina and talked about many, many things. And then today I got a card from Candice and Avi and Elyse and Alicia, and it’s like a little prayer/encouragement card and I want to hug them. Aw.
I’m still worried, because money is worrisome, but now I’m also happy. Maybe if I got out some crayons and made money more colorful-looking, it would be more fun. Hmm. :)
But I’m doing well. I play a lot of guitar. I’m teaching a guitar student Iron Man, and I’m looking for more students. I even have a music myspace, sarahroarmusic. Which has helped me to try to write more songs. Which is really therapeutic. And fun. I might join a soccer team this Saturday.
I went to my co-worker Ebonee’s African-American studies classes last Thursday at Temple University. And both the classes and talking around the classes were good. Good conversation.
Friday night after work everyone stayed late and hung out and had free drinks, and talked about Michael Jackson and Charlie Sheen and Lindsay Lohan. I mostly just listened. My boss kept complaining, trying to get me to talk, saying it was because of the beer, but honestly I felt sad talking about people’s lives falling apart. Well, then a decorative hanging fell off a wall and broke apart. Everybody freaked out. They believe there’s a ghost there. They said they had been too loud and made Emily mad, and Edgar said to leave the broken hanging on the ground so she feels guilty about it. Interesting night. I told Avi, it was cultural spectacles time.
Anyways, in general there's a lot of different people around, and it reminds me that I'm pretty different myself. And we're all pretty weird. Jonathan has a quote on his wall from Johnny Depp about how it wasn't the strange people that made him curious, it was the normal ones. Cuz normal ones are pretty strange. Which makes me think of this music video that you must go watch...
http://youtu.be/jJOzdLwvTHA
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CRAZY UPDATE. I think it was like half an hour after I wrote this, I checked my email. Like three hours before, my supervisor had emailed me saying she thought she had a way I could volunteer without using septa (public transportation). So I called her up. Apparently, she couldn't sleep last night, so she was thinking about work, of course. And one of the girls uses Philly Car Share (I remember when a friend and I thought we had come up with the idea of having a car people can share by online scheduling...nope, it's been around a while). And she lives above my internship (the business offices are on the first floor, while the co-founders and others rent out floors above). It's a spoken word class, too, one with 6-7 year olds, and one with older kids. And last night I wasn't even worrying, but even then God was like, yeah, I know you're gonna freak out, but check this out, I'm already pulling some strings, so don't forget I'm great.
I watched Rob Bell's Everything is Spiritual video a couple of nights ago. It was helpful to me, so tonight I searched for more of his stuff, and just finished watching the nooma Rich video, here:
...that we're saved by the grace of God by faith in Christ in order to do good deeds... In this way, they lay up treasures for themselves as a firm foundation for the coming age and in doing this they take hold of the life that is truly life.
It's about taking hold of the life that is truly life, it is about realizing that the kinds of people we are becoming matters.
Now if you're like me, you're looking for the pitch...this is about something much much bigger than giving to the latest cause...this is about how we view the world...this is about what you and I truly believe...that the way we are commanded to live is the best possible way to live Putting others first, that isn't so easy. Jesus said he came to serve, and serving takes sacrifice. It costs. It's hard to ask difficult questions about how we spend our money and what we spend our money on.
What can you do to be more generous? Who are you going to bless?
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Story
I wish I had watched this before today. I was working late at BuildaBridge, the organization I'm interning with that does arts education and intervention in transitional living facilities. I went to pick up dinner in a hurry - a philly cheesesteak. Right near the door a man asked me for change. I said I didn't have any - I was pretty sure it was true, although I just checked and I did have 45 cents. I went in and grabbed my dinner in a hurry and rushed back out. The man was still there. He had a dollar out and looked at me again, asking with his eyes. I just told him all I had with me was my plastic. I wasn't sure if I had change or not, but I was too busy to be bothered with checking. As I was walking away I wondered if he was hungry, if I could offer him half my sandwich. But again, too busy. That morning, I had thought about 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you,' and I had offered some of my orange to my supervisor. But I was too rushed that evening, I didn't offer her any. I just mostly inhaled it, although the last time we had shared it and it had been a nice time of talking.
I let time control me. I didn't live the best possible way to live. Granted, I was busy. And super hungry. But those are excuses.
What can you do to be more generous? Who are you going to bless?
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When I finished watching the Everything is Spiritual video, I wasn't sure Rob Bell had actually done a good job making his major point. I thought a bit about the whole controversy around his book, Love Wins. But mostly I thought about what he said about rectangles and circles. In two dimensions, it's an either/or situation. But then he gave the example of the marker he was holding, in three dimensions. If you asked a person who could see in three dimensions, circle or rectangle, they'd just be like, "yep." God would be like that, as he looks at us in and out of time.
I thought about that. And I thought about Bell wanting us to focus more on being than doing. He made that point well, but it stuck with me more because I've been reading Henri Nouwen's In the Name of Christ again, after my supervisor lent it to me. That's kept me sane. Honestly. I don't feel capable at my internship a good bit of the time. I used to get so much of my self-worth from being capable. Now I don't.
The first day I started reading Nouwen was after last week, which was the first real hard week, and that book uplifted me so much, I went in to work at the restaurant singing. And one of the girls said I was spiritual. I didn't know what that meant, so I asked. She said I seemed so connected with both what's inside of me and what's going on around me. That's not something I've often been told. But I realized that because of Nouwen's book, I was more freely being myself, confidently and without any hesitation interacting with my co-workers without worrying how I appeared. I think that's what she saw.
But the being and doing go together. That's part of Bell's whole point of everything being spiritual, because there is no word for it in Hebrew to separate your "spiritual life" from your day-to-day, physical life at work and home. And I think it goes back to the rectangle/circle point, too. That's important, because who you are affects what you do, and what you do affects who you are. I think this "being spiritual" is just when you're well aware of each, and why it is so and how you are supposed to be and do. Which goes back to loving your neighbor - and your God. And taking hold of the life that is truly life.
Because even with spring coming, and lent almost over, it's too easy to feel dead. And that's so lame. Because, well, you know. Easter. :)
I've been working on this song since last summer, I think. For a long time I didn't know how to end it. It's a good night for finishing.
I was listening to India Arie with Christy tonight, Ready for Love. And we started talking. Actually, we were both melted onto the futon and I talked and she nodded and then Moses came and there was macaroni and cheese. But I shared with her about how, especially as Christians, we talk about loving people all the time. But I don't know how much we mean it. Because love - even just brotherly love - is so difficult. My big brother James would probably have an apt example of this :)
This week I've questioned what I'm doing here, not a lot but a good bit. But if all I learn is how to have brotherly - and sisterly - love, that would be more than good enough.
"So. Anyways. Yeah." (The epitomy of Jr. High speech conclusions)
Don't worry. I'll get to the song, briefly. But first. TGIW. Thank God It’s Wednesday!
For me, it’s the end of my internship week work. And it’s been a busy one, and a harder one. It’s the first week where I’ve really had to learn from some mistakes at my internship. All is well by the end of it, but it’s hard to know how to take responsibility but not let yourself just be blamed unfairly. Because that just makes you feel so small. A lot of good has also happened this week to make me feel big…well, little, but happily so, in a big, beautiful world. Tonight is just like a sigh of relief.
I feel really grateful this week, mainly because I have a friend now who’s not just somebody I work or live with. Friday night I got off work early (which kind of sucked), so I went home and played guitar and tried to psych myself up to visit a bar. “The Mermaid Inn” is the only local place around that has an open mic on a weeknight, when I’m not working. Since Germantown Avenue also has some of the cute little coffee shops vibe, I was thinking of taking my guitar with me and setting up on the sidewalk for a while, or at least to have the choice to do so.
Well, I didn’t have the guts to bring the guitar, but I did go. Funny thing is, if I’d brought my guitar, I would’ve gotten to play, cuz the bar’s band cancelled. It’s rather shallow comparatively, but it made me think of how when Jesus did his miracles, it required an act of faith on other people’s part first. I think we must’ve talked about that at church or something recently. Anyways, cuz I did make a friend, and that was pretty cool. It was funny, cuz I had kind of hung around the door of the bar, nervous, and when I finally walked in I was like eehhhh this is awkward because there was like nine people in the whole place (since the band cancelled). But I sat down and ordered the drink I had researched beforehand that sounded the least alcohol-y tasting (heh heh), and started talking with Jonathan, since he was the only other person there without a friend.
And actually I’m texting him right now about checking out his Sunday church service, after he went to my church’s cell tonight. It’s amazing how much you miss hanging out with people, in general, when you’re new to a place, and even moreso I think how you miss hanging out and talking with Christians. At work actually there’s the guy that flirts with everyone, who asks me if I have a boyfriend (in Spanish), and Sunday I was like, “No, y no quiero un novio, necesito amigos primero, porque no tengo amigos” (No and I don’t want one, I need friends, I don’t have friends). The girl I work with was surprised, cuz that sounds so sad. But it’s true. When you’re new, you don’t have any. That’s why I’m grateful to have one. Being new, it’s made me think a lot about immigrants and refugees, and the class I took on ministry to them my last semester of college. And it makes me wonder what I’m going to do about it, and it makes me email my supervisor again asking about BuildaBridge’s trip to refugees in Atlanta, Georgia. *Ponder*
It’s been a really full week actually. Hiking along the Wissahicken trail w/ Jonathan and getting to have some good thinking/talking time that way, watching the new Invisible Children film (film quality down, but I think their programming/ministry is increasing, so I’m fine with the trade-off). Plus going back with Jonathan to the Mermaid Inn for their open mic.
Everyone was SO GOOD! And old, mostly. And folksy and hippy. And in some cases quite drunk. But nothing scary, just more like friendly older women singing and dancing along drunk. And, again, they were really good. There was a group of like 12 people, with several guitars and a stand-up base, a harmonica, an ocarina, a banjo, a fiddle, a clarinet, a piano thing with a hose you blow air into, plus like a 17-year-old girl rockin’ some emo-ish hair and some sort of choker necklace, and being really quite shy but friendly. It was cool. Then there was the act of the lady reciting All Along the Watchtower as poetry with musical accompaniment and the reminders of the crowd when she forgot the next line. And the old man with a cute old man voice singing about his love left behind in Venezuela. And shanty songs. And then me, plus the banjo, stand-up base and a few more people volunteering to play along.
That was nice. Then cell tonight, talking about a verse in Micah 7 that says something about, though I sit in the dark, the Lord will be my light. Several of the people in my group, or idk, maybe all of us, are going through some really difficult situations, so…talking about hope in that context…has to be more than just talk. The funny thing is, the group’s mostly agreed that hope isn’t that strong of a thing, that it’s…like, weaker than prayer, more passive, inactive. For me, hope is…something that is strong enough to carry you, it’s something sometimes just plain outside of yourself – not because it depends on your environment, but because…oh, I don’t know. It’s strong.
I have a lot of hope this week. I have three potential music students. I’m talking with Drexel university’s Music Therapy Director about what I need to learn to meet admission requirements. It’s stuff I really want to learn. I feel hopeful because two students in Maryland and North Carolina heard about the BuildaBridge Institute from my marketing emails to faculty, so I’m…actually helping people. I feel hopeful because…heheh…it’s silly, really, but because I’m #163 in the reverbnation philly local folk music charts. And, much more importantly, and I should pause here, because, because there’s a music conference in Atlanta, Georgia called Driven, that I want to enter, and then I think it’s a different one where you have to write a song about revolution to enter. And…I’m trying to do that. I don’t even know if it’ll happen, but I’m hopeful. *Shrug*
And now Atlanta, Georgia has come up again. And I’m hopeful about that, though I REALLY have absolutely no clue about that. And I’m hopeful listening to the video at the top of Amos Lee performing the song Cup of Sorrow in Atlanta. Which is interesting, because the lyrics go “I want to sleep with the promise of tomorrow, although tomorrow may never come." Hope is weird that way.
And this song of his, Jesus, makes me hopeful, too, to have someone put so openly feelings that people rarely share.
“I remember when I was wild and free. But now the world has jaded me, corrupted and defeated me.” I feel very grateful, because I’m feeling very wild and free. Free just to be me, weird as that may be. Free to be here in Philly honestly not knowing exactly what I’m doing, and not trying to pretend like I do. Free to just call out for help. Free to be really happy about seeing a bird and to get my dork on talking about how amazing the revolutions of the earth and planets really are. Free to let those revolutions give me hope, even as violent political revolutions don’t.
“There’s only one thing that’s free in this life……my love for you.”
Yesterday at work I overheard a daughter tell her mom she should work at the ice cream store so that they can have free ice cream. That was the mom’s response.
It was sweet. It was a strangely serious moment, too. It made me think of Pink’s strong, F**kin’ Perfect, the music video especially.
On a somewhat related note. My co-worker Ebonee is getting her degree in African-American studies. That same day she was explaining to me what that entailed, and gave an example of studying a writer said that there is an unspoken idea that to be white is to be human, and that many black people try to act/look white. It’s funny, cuz I’ve known so many white people who like to be told that they’re really black or latino or asian. Being yourself is not a skill easily come by. I
Personally, I’ve been trying to figure out if I want to do Invisible Children’s 25 event. The project it supports seems well-researched, locally supported and locally led (a rehab center for child soldiers and a radio network to warn of attacks and request med help). But the promotional videos make me uncomfortable. They do such a good job embracing who they are – mostly white culture, activist, competitive, fun, artsy – and it works well, with 12000+ signed up. But the fun, artsy part of who they are (and yes, hipster glasses-wearing) throws me off a little.
One of my issues with it is feeling like a hypocrite, supporting people there, but not here. Of course, that’s a great excuse to do nothing, anywhere. I partly feel better and partly feel worse about it because I might start being an assistant teacher in one of the homeless shelters sooner than expected. Better, because I can say I AM helping here. Worse, because I know my motivations are partly to feel better about myself, to be Somebody Doing Something, and I don’t want that to be what it’s about – especially not as a white kid who’d be helping primarily African-American (little-er) kids. I don’t want to make myself feel empowered at the expense of making them feel dependent or somehow weaker or “in need” or “at risk.”
But the thing is, I love the idea of doing it! And the fun, artsy side of Invisible Children is something I have, too. I love the idea of teaching kids music and helping them express themselves and think deeper in the process. And I don’t want to wait to do it until I go to another country or something. So I’m…taking baby steps, trying to be more proactive. That includes making a playlist of songs I can perform for busking, and researching places to play. We’ll see I guess. In the meantime, I got my BuildaBridge “Artists on Call” shirt, and I’ll wear it Thursday night to City Hall for the students’ art exhibit.
And in the meantime meantime, I’ll take the bus, where I’m usually one of one or two white people. And sometimes I’ll be singing on my way to the bus, and I’ll make a new friend, and sometimes I’ll be quiet and shy and not. I’ll try to sing more, though. I have a lot to sing about.
For instance, the fact that I have a roof over my head, a shelter, a safe place. Homelessness…is a scary word. Wednesday my supervisor had to leave my internship early, so I couldn’t stay there, and my cell group didn’t start for another hour, so I had nowhere to go. And I had already ordered a small pizza to share with my cell. So I ate a few pieces on somebody’s porch (hopefully they don’t mind!) and then I just walked around in the light rain for an hour. It was weird, to pass by all these homes and doors and none of them are for you. It’s a little silly, probably, but that made me understand homelessness a little more. If you know someone you can call on to help you, a door you can knock on, you’re homeless but you’re not alone.
It’s strange, to think about St. Francis. He was part of the young, urban group of cool kids. Apparently he dressed really stylishly and threw lots of parties, though his family was only just on the line of being “wealthy” by the city standards. Then he decided to be a homeless, wandering preacher who took shelter in an old church. And suddenly he wasn’t alone, either, because others joined him.
It’s crazy, honestly.
I think the first time I heard about St. Francis was actually through an Invisible Children video that featured Denison Witmer’s song Little Flowers. So good on them. And I just found out Denison Witmer used to go to the circle church. So good on them. Kind of a balance to me worrying about being…too much myself, I guess. Anyways, here’s the song.
St. Francis' "little flowers" are stories from his lives, about miracles and daily sacrifices. His sacrifices are rather as miraculous as the miracles.
I'm going to see the latest Invisible Children video about Tony, one of the original guys.
My life feels really routine. Which is funny, because it’s not: there’s not a whole lot that’s the same every day or week, and it’s not routine/boring, either. But it is beginning to feel more familiar, and I’m really grateful for that. For instance: • Walking down Washington lane’s mix of row houses and historic mansions to my internship. I’ve only done this route this week (the singing man Chad asked me if I wanted candy, and it was weird, so I avoid him now), but I like. • Waiting for the bus & counting the birds in the bush next to me as they sing. • Tuesday pm pomplamoose livecast – this will be my second time! Good night song! • Wednesday night church cell group, and Roula’s pizza before it (once). • Oatmeal with peanut butter for breakfast - every day except for one. • Toasting pb and j sandwiches. Because the bread is cold. • Eating breakfast in bed. Because I’m cold. • Eating brunch for free at work after my Sunday shift – tasty tasty tasty tasty. • Coming home after evening shifts with more energy than I had going into it. • Taking showers and feeling like I’m in a cocoon. • Thursday day-off visits to the Crooked Bookstore, while the washer/dryer go.
There was something new today though, that I hope becomes routine. Three red-breasted robins. Spring, are you coming? I walked off the sidewalk to go around one and not disturb it. Hopefully, none of the little kitty-cat friends I’ve made get hungry.
This Lent thing is better and worse than I thought it’d be. I miss facebook, but I know I’ll use it better because of this – I miss the ability to easily message friends and stay in contact. I don’t miss the wasting of my time. I do miss tv shows. A lot. But I’m using that time to build new routines. Playing guitar near daily. Reading and writing, too. Going to sleep when I’m tired. Reading my bible by playing guitar along with it. I’ve been sitting on Matthew 3 and John’s “brood of vipers!” talk to the Pharisees today.
I’ve been noticing other people’s routines, too. I want to have them: • Remembrance. Over lent, my church is doing weekly communion. • Generosity. Christy shares lots of her food with me. Liz, my cell group leader, has given me a couple of rides to church. Danielle, my internship supervisor, never hesitates to compliment or note good work. Edgar and Kim, who run Avenida, feed you every shift, and for Sunday brunch go all-out. Smorgasborg. Overwhelming. And then Edgar tells you to take more home. • Hard work. Most of my co-workers have at least one other job. Danielle works at BuildaBridge as the only FT paid staff (a lot of work!), and then has a dance instructor position, and THEN works at a restaurant. And she still has a bf.
I want to practice these habits till they’re just routine for me. I think moving makes you lose a lot of your old routines, and it throws you off. Even simple ones. That’s part of why I’ve been so anxious at my job (that and I don’t want to lose it). Anxiety’s very difficult to overcome. I really sympathize now with the movie character girl in the new city working at a restaurant. Heh. But apparently Edgar and Kim like me: a server told me they were planning to train me in all the different work, including server. Cool…gulp. Danielle likes me, too. I figured out how to use Adobe Illustrator to fix a flyer after a day of failure, since the marketing intern is on spring break. We were joking afterwards, and I said “yay, I’m going to be marketable!” And she quite nicely said I already was.
Of course, she’s way more “marketable” than me, but she has to have two other jobs. I’m realizing how much hard work is necessary, to do what you want with your life, help people. My head’s still sorting out Uncle Tom’s Cabin, and that book has taught me a lot about hard work and faith. It’s too bad the Uncle Tom character seems to be misunderstood. He’s impressive. And there’s quakers, too, in the book, and of course they’re big in Pennsylvania. Talk about hard work to help people. The book highlights their role in the underground railroad, the risks run and the work done. My bus stops right in front of a historic underground railroad stop. It made me pause to wonder today. I may visit Thursday. In the meantime, I tried to read Aunt Phillis’ Cabin (southern anti-abolitionist response to Uncle Tom’s Cabin), but it made me feel physically ill.
I want…to have routines that’ll make people feel good, not ill. There’s no underground railroad right now, though there’s an underground human trafficking trade. People are hungry for change, but they’re also just hungry. I can’t imagine. Last Wednesday I didn’t have money to buy Roula’s pizza before cell, so I didn’t eat dinner. I figured I’d just rely on the cell’s generosity, even if I did feel a little foolish eating so many of their little muffins. But it’s weird. I was so hungry, even though I’d eaten twice that day already. Everyday I feel hungry, though I eat a lot. I joked to Christy: “If I didn’t know myself better, I’d think I was pregnant, I’m so hungry.” Needless to say, I’m not pregnant, and I am eating well. But this amusing hunger of mine has made the video below about homeless kids all the less amusing. I hope you can watch it all, but at least see 4-7:20.
“Homeless kids tip-toe in a world of insecurity, hoping to be invisible.” If you watch the rest, you will see. It makes me grateful to be interning at BuildaBridge, and want to be a part of their programs within homeless shelters:
I mentioned that moving seems to make people lose a lot of routines. How much more homelessness must do this, hurts to think about. Same thing with refugees, whom BuildaBridge also does some work with. Art really seems…in my own life it has helped. The routine of it, the expression of it, the security of it. The city hall exhibit I’ve been helping with at BuildaBridge will make homeless kids’ art visible, and so it will make them visible, also. This is what I’m thinking about.
But now I’m late for the pomplamoose webcast. So much for routine ;) and they're talking about nuclear power plants. it's hard to be serious. now they're talking about nuclear power pants. it's really hard to be serious. and now they're singing jack's original, "the way it was before" and asking if their music's getting too dark. well, actually they asked if their shit was getting dark. tee hee. :) as long as their routine and life routines make space for addressing light and dark times/experiences, i like. if buildabridge's art programs only let the kids focus on happy, and avoided dealing with the sad, it'd be useless. but if it didn't teach how to see the good in the bad, it'd be useless. So.
As a writer/blogger, there is a lot of pressure to be speaking into the culture and producing output, but I often feel like I’m sacrificing a patient, reflective discipline for receiving input. Do I really have something to say about Rob Bell, especially so prematurely? Probably not. I’d rather read, listen, think more. I’d rather take things in slowly, ponder them, and then offer my two cents (if I have any).
That’s why for Lent this year, I’m going to give up blogging. …. During this season I’m going to be quicker to listen and slower to speak, meditating on the blessings of Christ in my life and drinking in his goodness in a deeper, more concentrated way. I want to slow down. I want to read more books and collect my thoughts. I want to think less of myself wherever possible, and think more about Christ’s sacrificial love–what it means for me, for my neighbor, and for the world.
I read this yesterday from a blog I follow, The Search. I’d been mulling over what to do for Lent. I had my no list: mostly shows. I had my yes list: walks, books, Bible, music. I had a qualifier: personal internet use at home only after a ½ hour of quiet/music time. I didn’t know anything about the Rob Bell thing until I read that blog, and then I watched his video for his book, etc. It once again brought to the surface some of the tensions I’ve been trying to patiently sit in, mostly unsuccessfully.
The Circle of Hope Ash Wednesday service had an activity to draw something that distanced you from God, then give it up for Lent, symbolically throwing the paper into the fire while everyone sang, because lent a time for setting fire to garbage that needs to be cleaned out. It hit a nerve, the same nerve hit by the blog passage I quoted. I didn’t have a pen, or a paper at first, but I knew what I would’ve drawn. An ear and a mouth. Getting sucked into all the talk.
I value dialogue and discussion, but sometimes all the talk just tires me out. Giving up all the tv shows was part of that, getting rid of some of the voices bouncing around in my head. Like in a book I was browsing that showed a picture of a curved line, asked if it was concave or convex, but the fact is it’s both, that very identity is interconnected, and you have to accept and engage that connectedness to really talk well about it.
I’m not going to stop reading, or blogging – I’m in the middle of Uncle Tom’s Cabin right now, and I realize it’s affecting me the same way reading Crime and Punishment did, leaving me impatient when I’m not reading it because that’s where my mind is, not anywhere else. But I am off facebook, so that I post less links and just think more for myself and care less about what others think about what I think, and spend more time asking God what he thinks. Or, at least trying to. I can’t count the number of times my finger’s hovered over the “f” keypad to type in facebook, and just that makes me realize how this is good for me. But I’ve also realized I don’t know how to contact lots of people outside of facebook, so I’ve had to be more intentional, which is good, but also difficult and a little depressing. But I’ve also done better things with my time this Thursday than I did last Thursday. And that’s real good.
I think it was the wrong question to answer, last two entries, about what I think about dandelions. What I think’s not too important. I can see the color purple and think of royalty or grapes or bruises or jimi hendrix’s purple haze. But is that the best/goodest (because I can) thing purple can make me think of? If I’m wondering if God’s kind of throwing dandelions my way, I should probably ask what he wants me thinking.
I finished reading the Color Purple today, after buying it for 25 cents at the bookstore down the street. I’d read it once before, but I didn’t remember a lot about it. There’s a lot that I learned from it and a lot I appreciate and agree with and a fair bit I appreciate but disagree with. I like how the characters talk about purple, and just creation in general, as God’s way of catching your attention. And I like this quote:
I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don’t notice it.
God and his plans and the universe and the color purple all kind of get along without me well enough. That's not an excuse; it’s good if I go with them and learn from it all, and help to keep the color around. But I don’t want to forget that it wasn’t me who made colors or dandelions in the first place, and it’s not me his plans are made for. Oddly enough, this echoes my response to a friend who asked me to unpack what I said last entry about God’s plans and how we might make them sort of not work out for ourselves. Basically: so what? That attitude doesn’t work towards others, but it works towards myself well enough when I get too self-centered.
So I’m rethinking dandelions, but I’m not in a hurry to get an answer. And as far as The Color Purple goes, I was glad to read the book again. I like being brought out of myself to think about being white or black from the perspective of a black person (and I like/hate trying to talk about that without sounding ignorant). I love the format as letters to God, and the faith involved in that there’s no letters coming back, and I identify with the change in how to understand God. I don’t go as far as Celie in calling God an it that’s just everything. I can’t seem to find anyone or any group or any book where I can just whole-heartedly agree with everything. I’m always a little to this or a little too that to fit in, although the good and bad of it is I can still belong, I think, and definitely still love.
Anyways. I spent my weekend keeping busy at the restaurant. After today I really began to feel comfortable and feel like I had made friends and belonged, and maybe even fit in a little. Maybe it’s that today I got to wear the Avenida Restaurant shirt. Maybe it was the heaps of food we were given to eat after the shift. Maybe it was just time. All I know is it’s nice. And my feet are very relieved, especially after mistakenly thinking I had to wear heels the first night: six hours standing, walking up/down stairs in heels led me to walk the block home in stocking feet.
I also played guitar and posted a new youtube video (cover of Do you Only Love the Ones that Look Like You! <3). I listened to Damien Rice for the first time. And I skyped with my daddy. We were silly. And I hung out with my roommate and it was good. This is our dining room table, home to many happy, hungry tummies. And that's my roommate, Christy. Say hi, Christy! Oh, and I didn’t mention it, but Monday night I got to babysit. And right now I’m skyping with my mom. And I received funny texts from my brother. Aww. Yay, life.
I’ve been learning that lesson about letting go this past week, from the previous entry. I visited my friend Viola in Camden, and I was nervous about it. I had a few reality checks. Flirtatious ticket vendors that made me feel awkward, but also made me smile at life. A young white girl and an old black man on the bus sharing war stories about their mugging experiences and the bones that were broken. The cheery black woman who came on the bus, took a look at me and the other white girl, and said – with this awesome great smile – “I’m SCARED, there’s so many white people!” It was kinda great, and it made me smile, too.
Viola lives on the grounds of a large NGO called Urban Promise. We spent the whole day in her house. We listened to music and she did gymnastic stuff and tried to dance. Lunch was fantastic, she had made some potatoes Ugandan-style…tastiness, partnered with convo about cultural assumptions. Good times.
Her house was built a few years ago by Extreme Makeover. Viola’s room had basketball murals on the wall, as well as the name of the two boys who were supposed to share the bunkbed left behind. The family couldn’t afford it in the end. It’s hard to help without hurting. I understand that. As I was waiting at the train station on my way home, I saw a guy asking for money coming my direction. After worrying so much about getting to where I was going, I felt grateful that it had went alright, and I sympathized with him. So I decided not to pull the “My ipod is on and I can’t hear you” card.
As I was getting out my money, an older woman came up and started loudly telling him to leave, that he shouldn’t intimidate people. She started waving her arms towards the security, but they just looked at her perplexed. Twice I told her “ma’am, he didn’t intimidate me.” She disagreed. So I told him, ‘you didn’t intimidate me.” I felt bad for him because he looked embarrassed, and bad for her because she was just so upset.
But for the first time in a while, I didn’t let it bother me. Usually I might do a ‘we suck’ thought project the rest of the night. But instead I just cocked my head to the side, shrugged it off, smiled and went back to my music. I don’t know if that was right. But it was nice. On the train ride back, I continued to be grateful about getting home safe. I had my own little happy epiphany as I was listening to Switchfoot’s Enough to Let Me Go, Free and Jon Foreman’s My Love Goes Free. I had been skimming a book by the Urban Promise founder earlier, and there was a section in it about subversive joy. It included a quote by Mother Theresa:
The best way to show our gratitude to God and the people is to accept everything with joy. A joyful heart is the inevitable result of a heart burning with love. Never let anything so fill you with sorrow as to make you forget the joy of the Christ risen.
I had posted that lion martyr Christian life sometimes the Christian life isn’t about you photo on my facebook. Cinda responded and said the Christian life is never about you. I’m still thinking on that Cinda. But joy’s definitely not about you or your troubles. Because joy comes from Christ, to you, when you understand why, and then you’re free to stop worrying and fearing for yourself. The circle cell group I’ve gone to so far just finished going through Philippians. The third chapter is where Paul’s like though I’m super awesome and do everything right, I count it all as nothing, for the surpassing joy of knowing Christ Jesus.
When I think about dandelions, I think about a lot of things. One of them is that each of the little fluffs is something I’m proud of about myself, something I get my sense of identity and worth from. These are things I like very much. But saying I count it all as nothing, that requires *whoosh!* blowing them all away, letting it all go. No longer worrying about it, fearing what others think of you. Of the many things I’m bad at letting go of, these are probably the worst. Yet it's all nothing, just little fluffs that are chasings after the wind. But that doesn’t mean I have to go all Ecclesiastes, dark clouds and frowns. Because joy says, yeah, that stuff’s not what matters, and I’m still here. I'm not there yet, but, like I said to myself when I walked past where I was going, I'm not lost either. I know where I am. It's just not where I thought I was going. But I know where that is, and I'm learning how to get there. So. Yay, joy. Okay.
And so, yay, after two mornings of having the random old guy on the corner do some kind of song/cat-call to me on my way to my internship, I can walk up to him – instead of past him – and greet him and get to talking and find out he’s a Christian counselor and herbalist. Okay.
And on my walk to the church cell group I can go at a snail’s crawl for a block and a half because I made friends with a kitty-cat and it knows my legs are for being rubbed against, not walking. And we make quite a spectacle of ourselves, me talking to it and it meowing at me and people walking past smiling, but really, it’s okay.
And I can not eat dinner tonight cuz I left my wallet at home and wait around at my internship for an hour and snack on Danielle’s carrots, so that I can go to cell and then hog all the snacks, after over-empathizing with the kitty-cat and its hungry/lonely-meows, and it’s okay. I actually really like over-empathizing with animals. It’s kind of my thing.
And I can admit to the cell group that I didn’t go to church because I hadn’t really felt like going to church. And I can ask questions about how he is the God of peace and yet in the OT he’s kind of a god of war, and I can feel stupid asking about that and not really have the question answered, but expect that, but listen to some good dialogue, and not really expect that, and knw the questions won’t be answered for years probably and I might not like the answers, but feel like it’ll be ok.
And, let’s see. I can start writing my first grant and need to re-write lots of it and learn how to mat pictures and go down to City Hall all within the first week of my internship and that’s definitely okay, because the programs administrator/everything supervisor Danielle is good at her job and blunt when she needs to be and encouraging when she needs to be and rather a lucky break for me. And I can be more nervous at my performance at the restaurant than at my internship, and that’s okay. And I can get a random babysitting job where the kid is adorable and I’m allowed to snack and I’m very generously compensated, and that’s definitely okay. And I can find someone to play guitar with and it sounds cool but I don’t know if it’s good and that’s okay, cuz I can change that or change me. And it can be cold, and that’s okay.
And my mom can rock, and that’s definitely okay, too.
Have you ever seen Horton Hears a Who? I’ve had that in my mind a bit lately, as dandelions keep coming up for me, and pieces of fluff remind me of dandelions. Seriously, though, I’ve got dandelions on the brain:
- on my flight to Philly I dreamt people were outside of my window flying on dandelion clouds - at BuildaBridge’s training we drew to classical music: arpeggios were a stick figure hanging on to a dandelion flipping around in the wind, along with the universe orbiting and ending where it began and stuff - I went into an Ikea for the first time. Epic. So streamlined, so efficient. This hanging light, radiating wires from its center tipped with white plastic strips to look like a dandelion. Beautiful shadows. - the front page of Circle of Hope’s church “map” has an action sequence of a dandelion growing in a bunch and then spreading out and flying away, as church growth. “Taraxacum officinale” are well-known for their ability to multiply, and their “long used culinary and medicinal values.” Wiki verified their history and potency as a healing root, particularly in China.
That’s why I asked people about them on fb – thanks for responding, really. I forgot about childhood wishes on dandelion fluff, even though I did it earlier this month! The idea of my grandma paying my dad a penny a pull for childhood chores to keep him from boredom is so sweet. I had forgotten they were considered weeds, and the curious case of how that status is decided (stop judging the weeds, they’re beautiful!). I need to read Dandelion Wine, and maybe try some, too. I also was introduced to a crazy-good song along those lines (thanks again Joanna!).
Joanna asked me what they meant to me. I’ll try to answer.
All those childhood wishes remind me of how I would always focus on the few tufts that didn’t fly away and pout. Sometimes it bothered me a lot – I didn't get my wish! But other times watching the rest of the tufts fly away balanced that sadness out. It was therapeutic, to breathe all that stress away with the flower. You let go and fly away yourself. It always reminds me of Jay Adams. The first seconds of this vid, it's just this young kid looking all adorable like he’s ready to blow out a dandelion and make a wish. As you watch, you see him and his skill grow, and if you watch the film, you see more. But even by the end of this clip...well, you'll see. It’s why it’s stuck with me all this time. It’s one of the reasons why I always feel a pain of worry and fear for adorable and talented little kids. Every single time.
Dandelions remind me of innocence lost and of regrets. As a friend posted alongside a picture of early Christians about to get martyred via lion dinner, God’s good plans for you aren’t always exactly what you expect, and honestly sometimes I think they just don’t exactly happen, either because of your mistakes or someone else’s. I haven’t tried to think that out theologically. I should, but I haven’t.
Anyways, with all that in mind, sometimes letting go doesn’t seem like a very good idea to me. The way Jay explains it interests me. He doesn’t really agree with the interviewer’s “still stoked” question. He just tries not to trip too hard.
Well. For more exciting words that actually talk about what I've been up to - trying not to trip too hard and let go - see the next entry! Exciting, right?
I found this Renew screen print with curbside trash. It’s cool. I just put it up on my wall and was playing guitar, admiring my orange wall, when it made me think. Wednesday morning around 3:50, my mom and I sang Be Thou My Vision while we waited for the SuperShuttle to take me away. Sunday evening at church they sang it during worship. Even being tired or sick, you can’t really sing that song half-way. I think I’ve been a little sick and tired on and off for several months. I’m hoping this gigantic, bright orange thing on my wall will help renew my vision and just me in general. Hopefully, this blog, as an extension of my whole experience, will do the same for you? Or at least make you laugh :)
In other news, there was a snow day today for the schools. It was lovely out, though, cold, but...doable. I don't want to speak too soon, but I think I'm going to be able to handle the weather. Our little green plants sure can! However, it DOES get cold when it comes to taking a shower. Luckily, the novelty of a cute bathtub makes up for it. Here's an illustrative example of my joy at the bathing situation :)
My interview at Avenida Restaurant went well - she's supposed to call back this afternoon to schedule a night for me to have a try-out shift. The daycare interview was postponed until Friday. I'm planning on attending a church small group Wednesday night after my first day of the internship, though we'll see how I'm feeling. I might have found someone to play guitar with. I wrote some thank you letters, although I haven't found the stamps I brought along yet.
So I guess that's that. Oh! And I have two missing right shoes. I left them at home, or someone really needed left shoes at TSA.
I am here, safe and sound. My traveling went really well. Apparently I stole the good weather, because my first two days were sunny and warm!
Christy picked me up from the airport, and her parents visited this weekend to help her buy a few things. They have all been very kind and hospitable, even taking me out to eat! It’s been a pretty busy couple of days, though, compounded by me getting a little sick after visiting the restaurant I’m applying to (uh oh!), but I’m resting up and still ready for the interviews tomorrow.
I’ve already done a fair bit of exploring. The first day I checked this “Crooked Bookstore” and walked around some. That evening I went to BuildaBridge’s initial introduction class for future volunteers. It was different, but good. The class was quite interactive and fun, with several different games I’m incorporating into my sample lesson for a daycare interview. The staff were quite friendly and encouraging, as well as excited about and committed to their work.
Friday I took the bus down to my internship, and it seems pretty simple. Plus, there’s an advertisement for a lawyer named Justin Bieber. So that’s priceless. Germantown Avenue is the main street that I live off of; it’s how I get to my internship and where lots of little shops are. It used to have a trolley, so the cobblestone, rails, and cables hanging overhead are still there. Makes for a bumpy bus ride, but it’s alright. On my way back on the bus, there was a cute little girl named Mimi, one of the really curious types, asking me and another girl dozens of questions. I was reminded of one of Flannery O’Connor’s short stories, “Everything That Rises Must Converge.” In that story a young white man and his mom take a bus ride. She makes him go with her because she doesn’t like riding alone on the recently racially-integrated buses. Plus a lot more, as there’s a lot more to the story, but you’ll have to read it.
Anyways, I thought of that because on my bus and his bus, there’s a cute black child that the white person (me) enjoys interacting with, and the child’s parent(s) who the white person doesn’t really interact with as much. Remembering it made me try to be more intentional in talking to the adult, and made me reflect on how I needed to do the same with my internship and just with every day. It is interesting to be in “one of the oldest racially-integrated neighborhoods in the country.” It feels very different at times, but it’s also been a pretty easy transition. I’ve had several people at BuildaBridge and at circle (a church group) talk to me about culture shock. I do feel it a bit, and I think I’ll be feeling it more. So there might be some fun stories out of that. But I’ve been struck by how most people/places/cultures I’m encountering have a kind of west coast twin: for instance, the circle church I attended reminds me of a tribe of l.a. church I went to, because they’re a bit slower maybe to hand out rules, and make good use of prayer/music/art. So I’m lulled into a sense of knowing, and then some little difference throws me off. Plus, when I went I was feeling sick, so that threw me off, too! Anyways, I want to see if there’s more local churches I can attend, too, since circle meets in center Philly, quite a ways away.
After church (which is in the evening) Christy and I took the subway and regional rail home, after visiting with a friend from Uganda, Charity. He happens to be doing the same internship another Ugandan friend of mine, Viola, is doing, so next weekend there’s going to be some sort of hanging out. I’m looking forward to it.
In the meantime, my room is coming together. I posted a few pics of it, and I'll post more of...more...soon. I didn't have to buy anything, it's all stuff that was left behind or left out on the curb or hand-me-down from Christy. I feel very lucky. And it’s still very nice and empty in the middle of the room, which helps my mind be less cluttered. I was tempted to buy furniture a couple of times, but I like this better. There’s actually weather now, with a little snow and “wintry mix,” so I’m listening to more of Jon Foreman’s Winter album while I try to get better and get ready for interviews and internships.
